X-Message-Number: 32449
From: David Stodolsky <>
Subject: Re: cryonics terminology
Date: Fri, 5 Mar 2010 10:36:26 +0100
References: <>

On 4 Mar 2010, at 11:00 AM, CryoNet wrote:

> I think to
> basically give up the idea that cryonics is much closer to  
> experimental
> medical care than anything else one can think of is what would  
> result in
> less sympathy for our efforts and not more.

It isn't a question of giving up an idea. It is a question of getting  
the majority of the population to even consider the idea. In the  
Badger Survey, about 20% of the people, most in the computer industry,  
indicated that nothing, including the revival of a human being, would  
make them change their mind about cryonics. No amount of logical  
argument, reasonable documents, reasonable people, etc. is going to  
effect these people, who were probably much more likely to be  
favorable than the general population. In my initial analysis, I  
concluded that only agnostics and atheist were likely to consider  
cryonics, even when the information was presented to them. These  
groups are a small minority of the US population and, therefore, they  
have little effect on public opinion.

Language is one way that a social group can distinguish itself from  
the mainstream. As long as terms like 'patients' are used to describe  
what law and society regard as 'corpses', cryonics will be an  
isolationist movement easily dismissed from serious consideration by  
the mainstream.


>
> Given your knowledge in the area, I am curious how social movement  
> theory
> looks at Christianity which is, of course, one of the major  
> religions in
> the world.

Social movement theory isn't the main line of my research, so I can't  
say much about this and what I can say may be wrong. However,  
Christianity is thought to have gone thru an isolationist phase and  
then made the transition to a mass movement, by the training of  
disciples, etc. One explanation for its spread is that it had a much  
more explicit belief in the afterlife than Judaism. At the time, the  
most accepted view of life after death was that it was reserved for  
noble persons, for example, those who could have pyramids or other  
symbolic representations constructed, that would outlast their  
physical existence. When the idea that anyone could achieve  
immortality by merely accepting Jesus began to spread, it became a  
mania among the poor, triggering a mass movement. So, the new idea of  
Christianity was a very minor change in the worldview of the  
population, that already accepted the idea of immortality by symbolic  
means for some.

Until quite recently, social movement theory and the sociology of  
religion have been independent fields of research. So, it isn't clear  
whether there is a widely accepted explanation for the spread of  
Christianity in social movement terms.


dss

David Stodolsky
  Skype: davidstodolsky

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